


an apple a day

by Kima



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: (only mentioned but shh), Cuban Lance (Voltron), Family Fluff, Family Shenanigans, Fluff, Fluff and Crack, Friendship, Gen, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lance whines, M/M, OT7, Pre-Relationship, Sick Lance (Voltron), Sickfic, cat aliens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 21:29:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,228
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14222172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kima/pseuds/Kima
Summary: Lance doesn't get sick, period. Except the one time he does and doesn't stop whining about it. Keith really doesn't know why he likes this idiot.





	an apple a day

**Author's Note:**

  * For [evlytheevilqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evlytheevilqueen/gifts).



> For the lovely Katja, a birthday gift after I knocked her out with angst in the angstfest fic (scream at the sky) and had to swear on my life to write her fluff.
> 
> Unbeta-d but with heartmelting fluff, found families and a Keith hardcore crushing on Lance.  
> You're welcome to come yell at me on my tumblr, joyfullychaotic

It all starts, rather surprisingly, with a violent sneeze smack in the middle of another meeting with alien leaders. It’s so loud and comes out so suddenly, without the slightest warning, that all seven alien dignitaries jump in surprise and one of them even dives straight under the table with a scared shriek. All eyes in the conference room simultaneously turn to Lance who looks as horrified at the sudden sneeze as the aliens are.

“Oh hell,” he blurts. “Sorry, I’ve got – sorry, sorry. Don’t mind me, all good over here, continue with the politics, nothing to see!”

Keith frowns at him from where he’s sitting, watching as Lance actually blushes and sinks down in his seat, obviously trying to disappear. On his shoulder, the largest of the mice is excitedly chittering at him as if it’s admonishing him for disturbing its sleep.

“Right,” Allura says with an apologizing smile to the aliens, extending a hand to help the alien hiding under the table get back up on its chair. “Where were we?”

The alliance talks resume and everyone seems to forget the incident – until dinner, that is.

Hunk, piling some food on Lance’s plate, nudges him with an elbow.

“The hell was that earlier, buddy?” The big guy looks genuinely puzzled. “You’re not getting sick, are you?”

“I’m not getting _sick_ ,” Lance retorts, sounding insulted by the very idea of it. He looks so disgusted that Pidge and Keith both snicker into their space noodles. “I don’t _get_ sick, I’m Mr Invincible! It was the mouse, it was swishing its tail like crazy, so I sneezed!”

“Eat your vegetables, Mr Invincible,” Hunk replies with a grin. “So it stays that way, too.”

Lance, being the mature person he is, just sticks out his tongue as his best friend and deliberately pushes the vegetables off his plate and onto Keith’s. Keith looks at the extra purple and pink vegetables on his plate, shrugs and continues eating – he’s not going to turn down extra food, not after living off of spam and beans cooked over a camping grill for a whole year.

“You know,” Pidge mutters from Keith’s other side, mouth stuffed with noodles, “I sometimes wonder if I’m really the youngest person in this group.”

“Only physically,” Shiro chuckles, eyes bright with amusement. “The level of maturity is not always linked to actual age.”

“Excuse you, I’m a very mature person!” Lance yells, waving his spork into Shiro’s direction and accidentally throwing a noodle across the table in his enthusiasm. It arches through the air and lands smack across Shiro’s forehead, causing the entire table to erupt in peals of laughter. It’s a nice atmosphere – and Keith loves it with his whole heart even though he’d rather die than admit it out loud. But for someone who’s spent his entire life alone and practically living a hermit’s life before he’s even turned 18, this is practically heaven: the easy camaraderie as Allura, with a badly suppressed giggle, picks off the noodle off Shiro’s nose with two fingers, the laughter as she uses said noodle to make a mock moustache and pretend to be Coran behind his back while he lectures Lance about proper table manners, the affection all between them as they continue to laugh and joke and eat, it all feeling exactly the way he’s always imagined a true family to be.

It’s all ruined, of course, by Lance and another loud, violent sneeze.

“Dude!” Hunk exclaims. “Not all over the food, I _worked_ to get those noodles al dente!”

“Are you sure you’re not getting sick?” Shiro looks at Lance, a slight frown between his eyebrows.

“I _never_ get sick,” Lance repeats and that’s the end of the discussion.

For that day.

The next morning, Keith is the first in the kitchen, as usual. He’s still half asleep since it’s still disgustingly early and he hasn’t had a cup of Coran’s coffee yet because it’s still idly bubbling and running through the futuristic gadget that poses as a coffee machine but can probably also used as a weapon, knowing Coran. A jaw-cracking yawn is the only sound Keith makes as he stretches, then bends down to reach for the nearest drawer to get a clean cup, idly wondering if he should go check whether Pidge has actually made it to her own room last night or if she’s fallen asleep down in Green’s hangar again. She does that, sometimes. But as he straightens up, he catches movement out of the very corner of his eyes and whirls around, immediately dropping into a fighting stance by pure instinct, the cup in his hand ready to be used as a projectile.

“ _Jesus_ , it’s just me! What the hell?!”

Keith blinks at the sight that he’s presented with, slowly relaxing and lowering the cup he was about to throw at the intruder. The intruder who has turned out to be Lance, of all people, who usually doesn’t get out of bed until breakfast is ready or the castle alarms are blaring at full force, looking weirdly pale and sporting dark circles under his eyes. He’s wrapped tightly in a blanket, hair tousled and looking like he just fell out of bed and yet hasn’t gotten a wink of sleep.

“Sorry,” Keith says, still blinking. “Thought you were… Nevermind. What are you doing here?”

“I’m fucking _freezing_ ,” Lance complains with a shiver. “Did Pidge mess with the heating system again?”

“No?” Keith, wearing only a tshirt and a pair of sweatpants, is actually barefoot, feeling comfortably warm, as usual inside the Castle. He frowns and looks Lance up and down. “Pretty sure her ears are still ringing from that lecture she got last time.”

“Well, _I’m_ freezing.” Lance sniffs and shudders inside his blanket cocoon. Keith notices, absurdly, that Lance is wearing fuzzy pink socks. “You’re not going back to sleep, are you?”

“No?” He’s so very confused about this entire exchange. Also, pink fuzzy socks.

“Good. I’m taking your blanket. Good night.” And with that, he turns and leaves the kitchen, still huddled in his blanket and still wearing fuzzy socks.

Keith isn’t entirely sure he hasn’t dreamed the whole thing up, to be honest, that’s how bizarre his early morning meeting with Lance is. By the time he’s downed his cup of coffee, gotten dressed properly and has found Pidge soundly asleep, softly snoring with her glasses hanging off one ear, curled up like a kitten between Green’s paws with a blanket haphazardly thrown over her, he’s almost forgotten about the weird encounter – until breakfast, that is.

When the rest of the team slowly shuffles into the kitchen where they usually begin their days on slow mornings like this, Lance is suspiciously missing.

“Has anyone seen Lance?” Allura asks, thin brows furrowed. Hunk shakes his head, mouth full of scrambled eggs (gifted to them by one the alien dignitaries from yesterday) but thankfully keeping his mouth closed. Pidge, sipping her black, unsweetened coffee still bleary-eyed and with an expression on her face that promises to kill anyone speaking to her before she’s emptied at least half of her cup, gives something like a negating grunt instead of a proper answer and Shiro actually speaks up.

“Not since yesterday, no.” He looks thoughtful.

“He said he was cold, earlier,” Keith says, frowning down at his eggs and tofu-like bacon strips that Hunk always manages to fry to perfection. “I think he stole my blanket.”

“Cold? Maybe he _is_ getting sick…” Keith looks up to catch Shiro’s worried expression, already well on his way into Team Mom Mode.

“Lance doesn’t get sick, though,” Hunk chimes in, thankfully only after swallowing his huge mouthful of eggs. “He hasn’t been sick a single day since I’ve known him, it’s like his immune system is supernatural or something. Must be all that spicy Cuban food.”

“Everybody gets sick!” Allura replies with a shake of her head. “Coran got the Slipperies, remember? And I had this unfortunate allergic reaction on planet Rodia…” She blushes, the tips of her pointy ears going adorably red. Keith snorts into his third cup of coffee; _unfortunate_ is a pretty mild description of the rash their princess got from the flowers a grateful group of aliens has handed her when they met with them on their home world. She’s spent three days covered in itchy spots she wasn’t allowed to scratch and running so cold that everyone avoided touching her the entire time while her skin turned between all colors of the rainbow.

“Even Keith got sick, his first year at the Garrison,” Shiro recalls.

“It was that flight instructor’s fault,” Keith grouches, remembering the week spent shivering and buried under a veritable mountain of used tissues. “He came in with a fever and got the whole class sick!”

“I had to force him to stay in bed.” Shiro’s voice is lowered as if he’s letting the others in onto a huge secret. “He seriously tried to go to class.”

“It was two weeks before finals!”

“And you were oozing snot!”

Keith huffs, unwilling to argue more about this. Secretly, he’s glad that he stayed in bed during that time, knowing full well that others in his class didn’t and instead carried their colds and fevers straight into finals week. He can imagine better ways to spend a finals week than feeling like death warmed over thrice.

“That still doesn’t explains where Lance is, though,” Allura cuts in, still frowning. “Should we go check on him?”

“No need for that, princess.” They all look to the door to see Coran, twirling one end of his moustache with one hand. “It appears as if the boy has decided to sleep in and take it easy. Maybe we should all take an example and do the same? All of you _have_ worked really hard these past weeks.”

Keith has to hide a smile in his coffee cup; leave it to Coran to take the Team Mom title from Shiro. He glances at Allura who hums thoughtfully into her own breakfast.

“Well,” she says. “I suppose… we did. And the next meeting isn’t for another few days… I guess we can allow ourselves a day of rest.” She smiles, leaning back in her chair and looking more like the teenage girl she is and not the princess she has to be usually. Keith silently wonders what she’s going to do with her free day – he can’t imagine Allura just lounging around and relaxing, no matter how hard he tries to. She seems more like the type of girl to go beat up training bots and he hopes she won’t get in his way because that’s exactly what _he’s_ going to do.

“Oooohhh!” Hunk’s eyes actually light up. “Really? We get a free day? No training, no – no being chased around the Castle to clean?”

“No training,” Allura confirms but smirks into Coran’s direction. “I am not so sure about the cleaning…”

“Not it!!”

There’s a mad scuffle as Pidge and Hunk both make a break out of the kitchen, accompanied by Allura’s delighted laughter and Coran’s insistence that cleaning duty is a very integral part of their lives around here.

“I’ll help you,” Shiro volunteers.

“It’s quite alright, my boy.” Coran smiles and steps toward the table to sit down on Pidge’s deserted chair. “I think I will take a rest, myself. Maybe work on my crocheting…”

“You crochet?” Keith can’t even pretend to hide his surprise.

“Why, yes. I think it’s quite therapeutic! Maybe you would like to try it, too? I could teach you.”

“Err. No, thanks, I’ll – uh – I’ll pass.” There are things he’s willing to try but crocheting is definitely not one of them. “Sorry.”

“Suit yourself, my boy!” Coran, thankfully, doesn’t seem to be insulted, instead humming a happy tune and merrily digging into the leftovers of Pidge’s breakfast. Allura still seems to be lost in thought about what to do with her unexpected free day, distractedly giving small pieces of something like cheese to the mice who happily skitter around the table and chirp at all of them while Shiro finishes his coffee and gets up.

“Well, I’m going back to my room,” he announces. “There’s a book I’ve been meaning to finish for weeks…” He looks so content and happy, Keith can’t help but smile. It’s rare these days to see Shiro so relaxed, after all that’s happened to him, so it’s a real gift that he can still do it and Keith never stops being grateful for it. “What about you, Keith? Heading to the training deck?”

“Yeah.” He smiles back at Shiro after downing the last of his coffee, quietly amused that everyone seems to be used to his habits and rituals by now. “Want to join?”

“Maybe later,” Shiro replies as they nod their goodbyes to the two Alteans and head out of the kitchen. “I’m actually looking forward to finishing my book.” He just looks so happy about the prospect of some peaceful alone time just spent reading that Keith is almost tempted to join him – even though he’s never been much of a reader, more of the outdoors-y type of person who’d much rather wander around and _do_ something than stay stuck in a room with his nose in a book.

“Okay,” he says easily instead, smiling at his oldest friend, so much like an older brother by now. “See you later, then.”

They nod at each other, still smiling, and then go their separate ways.

Keith doesn’t think about Lance’s suspicious absence from breakfast until a few hours later when he wanders back to the kitchen to get something to drink. He’s sweaty from his training session but feeling better than he has in ages. Wiping his face and neck with a towel, he doesn’t immediately notice the lump lying on top of the table until he’s halfway to the fridge to grab some juice but when he does, he sort of freezes and just stares for a moment.

There’s a vaguely human-shaped blanket burrito half sitting, half lying on one of the chairs, head resting on the table with a tuft of messy, dark hair sticking out. How it manages to breathe is a complete mystery to him.

“Lance?” he asks, stepping closer and leaning down. The blanket burrito makes some noise that could be anything between a groan and a grunt but doesn’t move; the only way Keith really knows it’s Lance is because he’s still wrapped in the same blanket he showed up wrapped in this morning.

“Listen – if you’re sick, you really shouldn’t…” He trails off uncertainly. He’s not good with taking care of people, isn’t the motherly type like Hunk or even the big brother like Shiro who both fuss and care and would probably be a hundred times better at handling this situation. Half considering to go call for either of them, Keith glances at Lance and chews on his lip for a moment.

He hates feeling uncertain and stuff like this makes him uncertain as hell.

“’m not _sick_ ,” Lance protests from the safety of his blanket. “Jus’ wanted… t’drink…”

Keith rolls his eyes. Even a blind man can see that Lance has clearly caught some weird space bug that’s making him look like hell warmed over in a microwave but that idiot still insists he’s healthy?

“You’re fucking sick,” Keith tells him, no patience for the stupid denial game. “Go back to bed and stop spreading your germs around before you infect us all.”

“ _Your_ germs infect ‘sall,” Lance mumbles back, making even less sense than usual.

“That doesn’t even make sense,” Keith tells him and gets another grunt-groan in reply.

“Thirsty,” Lance complains, managing to sound both whiny and indignant as if it’s somehow Keith’s fault that he’s thirsty.

“Ugh…” Keith huffs and rolls his eyes again but does walk over to the fridge to get his juice, grabbing a bottle of water for Lance while he’s at it, putting it next to Lance’s head. “There. Or do I need to get you a sippy-cup too?”

“Fuck you,” Lance grumbles back at him, sitting up slightly with what looks like the most difficulty he’s had since he almost got blown up by a bomb and reaching for the bottle of water to down around half of it like he’s been dying of thirst, slamming the bottle back down on the table and hiking up the blanket up to his ears again before lying back down.

Keith watches him for a few minutes, sipping his juice, getting more irritated by the second.

“… Are you seriously gonna stay here now?” he asks finally, eyebrow twitching upwards. Lance grunt-groans again but doesn’t move. Keith sighs, setting down his juice and reaching for Lance, grabbing what he assumes to be his arm and dragging him off the chair.

“Come on, you giant drama queen, I’m getting you back to your room…”

Lance lets out some token noises of protest but is either too weak to actually fight him off or doesn’t actually want to, despite his claims that he’s healthy. Because it’s clear that he definitely is anything but healthy – he’s a messy heap of snot and sneezes and shivering limbs, resembling a blanket burrito more than an actual human being, his gangly form more hanging off of Keith than actually walking by himself.

“You’re such a-“, Keith grunts as he carry-drags his fellow paladin across the Castle back to their rooms, “such a pain in my ass, it’s not even…”

“Y _ou_ ’ra’ain,” Lance slurs back, attempting (and failing) to glare at Keith from inside the blanket cocoon.

“No, _you_ are,” Keith tells him with finality, feeling more childish the longer this conversation lasts if it can even be called that.

By the time they finally reach Lance’s door, Lance is almost half asleep. Keith rolls his eyes but carefully opens the door, dragging Lance inside and depositing him on the bed as gently as he can. Lance lets out a quiet whine and curls up in a tight ball on top of the bed, burrowing into his blanket with a shiver so strong that he shakes from head to toe.

“ _Cold_ ,” he complains, eyes squeezed shut. Keith looks down at the sorry sight, huffing slightly as he crosses his arms and thinks. He’s no good with sick people or taking care of others – that’s why he’s not entirely sure what to do now. From carrying Lance across half the Castle, he’s at least sure that Lance has a fever, even if he doesn’t have any way to actually prove that. For a moment, he thinks about getting Shiro so they can just shove Lance into one of the healing pods to speed up his recovery but then decides against it; as great as the pods are, the best cure for a cold has always been lots of fluids and lots of rest and he doubts that the pods could substitute that.

“Such a pain,” Keith sighs but it comes out way fonder than he intends it to be. Blushing softly, he just hopes that Lance is too out of it to pay much attention to him and hurries out of the room to go grab his own blanket from his room across the hallway that he dumps on top of Lance’s shivering form.

“There you go,” he says. “Just… stay in bed and don’t move, for fuck’s sake. I’ll get you something to drink. Just don’t move, you hear me?”

Lance’s answer sounds vaguely positive so Keith takes it as a yes, watching Lance wiggle under the second blanket to wrap it around his body too. It looks both ridiculous and pathetic and Keith can’t believe that this is what he spends his free day with.

He rolls his eyes again and wanders back to the kitchen to grab a new bottle of water for Lance and make a big cup of hot tea from Shiro’s secret stash – he thinks Shiro will forgive him, this once. The tea is some weird herb blend from one of the planets that joined the Coalition, surprisingly reminiscent of some of the tea blends Keith remembers from Earth and smelling faintly of something like mint. Figuring that it can’t make things worse, he gets both the steaming cup of tea and the water bottle and delivers them back to Lance who by now is completely hidden beneath the blankets.

“I brought you something to drink,” Keith announces, feeling awkward about the whole situation. “The tea is still hot, so… careful with that. Make sure you drink and uh, sleep. I’ll, uh, guess I’ll come check on you again later…” He trails off again, looking at the sad lump of blankets and pillows that is Lance. The lump gives no answer and Keith figures it means that he’s fallen asleep again.

At least he hopes he’s just sleeping and didn’t die from lack of oxygen.

But the lump is rising and falling slowly with ragged breaths so he must still be alive and Keith leaves the room, feeling a bit weird about the whole thing. But since he also can’t very well stay inside Lance’s room and watch him sleep because that would be creepy and all sorts of inappropriate, he opts to return to the training deck to beat the awkwardness out of his feelings by destroying a couple of bots.

Another few hours later Keith feels much better and way less awkward so after a much needed shower, still ruffling his wet hair with the towel hanging around his neck, he’s collected enough to sneak a peek into Lance’s room before he heads to the kitchen for dinner. Lunch on free days is generally handled by the policy of “eat what you find” and everyone who isn’t especially gifted at cooking (i.e. anyone who isn’t Hunk) always looks forward to dinner because Hunk usually goes all out. It’s unthinkable for anyone to miss out on that – except, of course, Lance who is still pretending to be a pile of vaguely human shaped blankets, shivering in the dim darkness of his room.

“… Are you still alive?” Keith calls inside carefully, not daring to walk in further lest anyone catches him. He has a reputation to uphold, here.

“I’m dying,” Lance informs him, obviously going for dramatic whine but failing miserably because it just comes out raspy and pathetic. Keith huffs.

“You hungry? It’s dinner time.” His only answer is a pathetic raspy whimper. So Keith sighs and adds, “I’m gonna tell Hunk to check on you later and bring you some, dunno. Space chicken soup, or something.” Lance whimpers something intelligible in response and Keith decides to leave it at that, making his way to the kitchen instead and silently wondering where Lance caught this space bug while everyone else seems to be just fine.

The kitchen, of course, is as rambunctious as ever – Hunk is over at the stove humming over several steaming pots while Pidge and Allura have a very intense discussion and the mice chase each other throughout the room, trying to get Hunk to trip and drop some food (joke’s on them, he never does but sometimes, he’ll _pretend_ to drop something because it makes the mice chirp with happiness).

“Keith!” Hunk swivels around to him, beaming widely. Keith would probably turn right around and leave again if he wasn’t used to the sunny happiness that is Hunk; by now, he still feels mildly uncomfortable when faced with it but it also makes him weirdly happy because it’s so _nice_ to have people be genuinely happy when they see you. “There you are. Sit down, sit down, food’s ready in a minute!” Keith’s ducks under his swinging arm holding a bright yellow ladle and slides into his seat next to Pidge, easily stealing the mug in front of her to take a sip of her juice.

“Go get your own,” Pidge hisses at him without looking away from Allura, still explaining some complicated diagram with mostly her hands. Keith, feeling warm and silly, sticks out his tongue at her and takes another sip with a wide, shit-eating grin. Pidge attempts to dive after it but is stopped by Shiro’s amused voice,

“Now, children, what did I tell you about fighting at the dinner table?”

“You’re not my dad!” Pidge announces immediately and Keith looks up in time to see Shiro, eyes sparkling with mirth, clutch dramatically at his chest.

“I’m not? Pidge, you wound me. My own daughter!” The kitchen erupts with laughter, the space dad joke will never get old and neither will Shiro ever stop making fun of it even more than any of the others. Keith dutifully returns Pidge’s mug to her and glances towards Allura, always a little worried about her reaction; not because he doesn’t trust her or anything – they’ve proven that they work well together and she has never treated him differently for being half Galra again after apologizing for it. It’s just that they all have their emotional scars around here; Pidge, Hunk and Lance, missing their families out here in space who don’t even know where they are or if they’re even still alive; Shiro, still traumatized from his captivity with the Galra and suffering from nightmares and whatnot; Allura and Coran, alone in the universe as the last of their people and still fighting the same battle that killed their people thousands of years ago.

Keith knows what it is to be alone and knows what it is to suddenly find himself surrounded by people, by having a _family_ he isn’t even related to after all these years of fighting for himself and he knows the value of families of choice. And just as it makes him equally sad and happy at the same time, he assumes that it does the same for her, judging by the way she turns away to subtly wipe away at her wet eyes while Shiro greets Hunk and easily sits down at the table, too. But as she catches Keith’s eyes, she blushes a bit and shakes her head, a silent plea not to ask and the smile she gives him a wordless assurance that she’s alright – or going to be, at least. He nods at her, never one to stick his nose into other people’s problems, and instead looks over to Coran who, thinking himself to be sneaky, tries to peek into the pots on the stove but earns himself a slap on the hand with Hunk’s ladle.

“Bad space uncle!” Hunk admonishes him, still waving his ladle in the saddest semblance of a sword if Keith has ever seen one (though he doesn’t doubt that Hunk is more proficient with a ladle than he himself is with a blade) and clucking his tongue at Coran. “You’re supposed to be the adult here!”

“Ah but where is the fun in that, my dear boy?” Coran grins, swiping one finger along the ladle as he slips past Hunk and thus successfully getting to the sauce none of them is usually allowed to try before it’s on their plates. He sticks the finger into his mouth with a triumphant noise which causes Hunk to squawk in indignation and chasing the laughing Altean around the counter in the middle of the kitchen. Keith and the others erupt into laughter again and he feels that warm ball of affection swell in his chest that usually threatens to overwhelm him in situations like this; he’s not used to being this fond of other people.

But this time, it’s not quite as strong as it usually is when shenanigans like this happen – and he knows exactly why.

“Lance isn’t feeling well,” he blurts into the room just as Coran trips over the mice and crashes to the floor while Hunk slides to a halt, just barely avoiding to crash on top of him. Everyone turns to look at him, surprise written plainly across their faces.

“Did you check on him?” Shiro asks. “I knocked earlier but there was no response, so I assumed he was out somewhere…” His expression is weird. Keith doesn’t like it.

“I found him being pathetic around lunch,” he replies with a shrug, not willing to elaborate. “Made him go back to bed and drink something.”

“But Lance doesn’t _get_ sick,” Hunk insists even as he grabs some plates to distribute the food he cooked. “Honestly, he just doesn’t.”

“You’re welcome to go check on him yourself.” Keith crosses both arms in front of his chest, leaning back in his chair. “But last I saw him, he insisted that he’s dying _and_ he has my blanket as well as his own.”

He decides not to tell the others that he himself brought Lance the second blanket. They’d never let him live this down.

“I’ll check on him after dinner.” Hunk looks honestly concerned. Keith can’t even blame him; these two are thick as thieves, it’s a testimony to Hunk feeling comfortable around here that he isn’t glued to Lance’s side 24/7 anymore. “Maybe I’ll make him a chicken soup… Hmm, I wonder if I can find anything that tastes like chicken? And I’ll need pepper… so much pepper…” He mumbles to himself about ingredients and how to substitute whatever they don’t have up in space while piling up food on their place and distributing them almost mechanically until everyone has a plate filled with so much food on it that Keith seriously wonders if Hunk is fattening them up for something.

The others seem just as puzzled and Pidge appears positively _dwarfed_ by the mountain of food on her plate. She pokes at it with a wary squint, lifting her head to look at Hunk and voice everyone’s thoughts in a facial expression that basically just says “the fuck, dude?”

Hunk blinks at Pidge, then looks down at the plates on the table and shrugs.

“What? I get nervous when you guys feel sick, I know I’m a mother hen! Let me!”

“It’s okay, Hunk,” Shiro smiles, waving the younger boy over to come sit with them. “Just don’t complain when we can’t finish our plates.”

“It’s good,” Keith pitches in, already several spork-fulls into his own portion and stuffing his face with what tastes like lamb curry but very likely isn’t considering that it’s a very unhealthy Smurf blue and doesn’t contain neither lamb nor curry. But Hunk is a master chef like that, making Smurf blue work in food somehow.

“Aww Galra Keith!” Hunk beams at him and Keith doesn’t even react at the stupid nickname. Really, he’s mostly used to it by now. “That’s why you’re my favorite!”

“I thought Lance was your favorite?”

“Well that goes without question.” Hunk scoffs at him. “But you’re my favorite when Lance isn’t there, duh.”

“Hey!” Pidge pipes up, sounding offended. “And what am I, chopped liver?!”

“If you were, I’d like you much better,” Hunk muses.

“Rude!”

“That’s what you get for never eating your vegetables!”

Keith listens to their squabbling and smiles to himself. Who even cares that they’re not actually related? Family is family, blood or no blood.

Their merry round of mischief shenanigans is interrupted when a slightly nasal whine comes from the direction of the hallway, demanding to know,

“Why are you guys having fun without meeee…?” Keith looks up in surprise to see Lance, still a blanket burrito par excellence, pale-faced and puppy-eyed, pouting dramatically and holding a pillow to his chest, swaying slightly as he leans against the doorframe.

“Lance!” Hunk, bless his motherly instincts when it comes to all of them, leaps to his feet and to his best friend’s side immediately, wrapping him in a hug. “Are you okay? Are you feeling better?” Not letting Lance actually answer any of that, the big guy puts one hand on Lance’s forehead and hisses. “Jeez, buddy! That’s no good, you have a fever! What are you doing out of bed, get back there right this instant, hop to it!”

“Nooooo~,” Lance whines against Hunk’s chest, dramatically sinking against him, knowing full well that Hunk can not only hold his weight but probably bench press half of the people in this room with ease, too. “Don’t wanna be alone… I need love! And hugs…” He sniffs, effectively just pulling up snot with a disgusting sound.

Keith is pretty sure he’s never seen anything as pathetic in his entire life before.

He also really, really wants to hug Lance.

Squashing down that silly notion, he instead says,

“Go back to bed before you get all of us sick, too. And blow your nose, for Pete’s sake, you’re disgusting!”

“Too weak,” Lance whines in reply, hiding his face in Hunk’s chest. “Hunk, he’s mean to me again! Make him stop…”

“He’s right, though.” Hunk frowns and pulls out a handkerchief from the pocket of his apron. “Here, stop wiping your snot on my shirt, you big baby.”

“’m not a baby…” But it comes out as another sad whine and convinces absolutely no one. While Hunk (who deserves an award for best friend ever, as far as Keith is concerned, because nothing would get him to do this, stupid crush or not) helps Lance blow his nose, resulting in the loudest foghorn noise to grace this kitchen, Shiro frowns at Coran.

“Do you have anything for colds? Do Alteans even get colds?”

“What… are colds?” While Pidge explains the biology behind a common human cold to the two confused Alteans, Hunk throws away the handkerchief and fusses some more over Lance.

“I don’t think we’re stocked for anything like that,” Coran finally says, twisting one end of his moustache thoughtfully. “But if I remember correctly, the Mogiyyar’s planet is nearby, they might have something? And they _did_ invite us to visit again, we could even make it a formal visit for their harvest festival…”

“They’re cats,” Pidge frowns. “What would they even harvest, catnip?”

“Don’t just assume they’re carnivores! They could be herbivores,” Hunk cuts in, somehow still able to keep track of the conversation from where he’s making Lance drink some more water. Keith, however, is completely lost – how did they get from Lance being sick to catnip?

“I wouldn’t want to impose on them,” Shiro mumbles, clearly uncomfortable. “They invited us back out of gratitude for bringing back their High Priest.”

“Well, yes,” Allura says. “But if we do visit them again, we can talk to them about the Coalition this time. And partake in their harvest festival, I’m sure they would appreciate sharing their culture with us!”

“But I wanna see the kitties again, too,” Lance whines from the door, pathetically sniffing again.

“You’re staying in your bed, Mr Invincible,” Hunk tells him sternly. “And I’m staying right here with you.”

“Actually,” Coran says, “I was hoping you would come along, my dear boy. You probably know best which medicine would work on Lance, yes? We wouldn’t want another filstleworth incident, now would we…” Everyone present shudders at the memory. No, no they would not want another one of these.

“I’ll stay,” Keith volunteers. “I don’t think they liked me much, last time…” Not to mention that he hates crowds with a passion and a harvest festival sounds exactly like the place to avoid.

“You realize that you’ll have to babysit that idiot?” Pidge asks, jabbing her thumb into Lance’s direction. “He’ll be your responsibility.”

Keith opens his mouth to retort something scathing but – he can’t. Lance’s pleading, bleary eyes and the fine sheen of sweat on his too pale face are enough to bite back the remark he is about to make and instead nod his head.

“Yeah,” he says. “I know.”

And that’s how Keith ends up alone with Lance the next day while the others go to visit the cat aliens they befriended a few months ago. And because Lance is a whiny-ass baby when sick, apparently, he somehow convinces Keith to sit with him in Lance’s room because _what if I die of this space bug, Keith? What if this is my last wish? You can’t deny a dying man his last wish!_ And really, what can Keith say to that? He is, of course, reasonably sure that Lance will not be dying from a common cold but on the off chance that it is anything worse than a cold, he doesn’t want to risk it.

And it isn’t because Lance’s puppy eyes apparently need their own weapon license. Definitely not that.

“I’m boooored,” Lance whines for the umpteenth time in half an hour, once again doing his best impression of a caterpillar. He’s now wrapped in no less than four blankets and still shivering underneath them all; Keith can hear the chattering of teeth from his spot on a chair next to the door.

“Wait, let me put on a dress and dance for you,” Keith deadpans, not looking up from his Marmora knife. With nothing else to do, he’s resorted to polishing it, making sure to clean all the small specks of dirt on the blade.

“You’re supposed to take care of me!” Lance huffs from beneath his blanket pile.

“I am taking care of you,” Keith replies calmly. “I’m here making sure you don’t suffocate in there.” Lance grumbles something intelligible and rustles around on the bed, apparently trying to get comfortable without moving too much. Keith glances up from the blade in his lap and watches Lance squirm and move around for a few minutes until his patience runs out. He’s not the most patient person on his best day and watching over Lance who looks adorably ruffled whenever he emerges from his cocoon isn’t making it any easier on him, here.

“What even are you doing?” he asks. “Just go to sleep, you’ll feel better after.”

“… can’t…” It’s mumbled so quietly that Keith almost misses it.

“Why not? Just – close your eyes.” That worked for him when he was sick the last time – though he had trouble keeping his eyes open in general back then.

Lance mumbles something else but this time it’s definitely too quiet.

“What was that?”

“You heard me, you asshole!” Lance grumbles.

“No I didn’t,” Keith protests. “Speak up if you want something.” Why does he even like this idiot, Keith wonders sometimes. He honestly doubts his own sanity, sometimes, for falling in love with goddamn _Lance_ , of all people. Why couldn’t it have been someone less annoying?

It should have been Hunk.

Everyone loves Hunk.

“I miss my _mom_ , okay? You happy now that you made me say it?”

Keith blinks.

That’s… not what he expected.

He opens his mouth but closes it again. Shit. He’s not good with this. He can’t even handle his own feelings, ninety percent of the time, much less other people’s. And this is a sensitive topic, Keith knows. It’s no secret that out of all of them, Lance is probably the one who suffers from homesickness the most… And really, it’s not that much of a surprise that it comes up now that Lance is more vulnerable than usual.

“Um,” Keith says intelligently. “I – She takes care of you usually, when you’re sick?”

“’m _never_ sick,” Lance informs him, once again sniffing unattractively and then blowing his nose pointedly. Keith rolls his eyes but waits for him to continue, not knowing what else to say. It’s quiet for a while but then Lance quietly adds,

“My sister, Rosa… She’d get these real bad coughs sometimes. ‘n Mom always… she’d cook her _fricasé de pollo_ – chicken stew, y’know? And just…” He sniffs again. “I miss them.”

“… I’m sorry,” Keith says because what else _can_ he say? He suddenly feels uncomfortable and overly aware of his own hands, not created for healing like Lance’s mom’s or Hunk’s but only every used for destruction. He’s a warrior, not a nurse.

He suddenly regrets volunteering to look after Lance, he’s clearly the worst nurse in the universe.

“Then come here and _hug_ me,” Lance demands with another whine. “I was promised hugs!”

Keith drops the knife.

“Please,” Lance whines and wiggles around a bit until his head pops out from under the blankets, hair ruffled and eyes rimmed red, nose snotty and lips dry. It should, by all means, not be attractive. And yet, Keith feels his heart do a weird wobble inside his chest and he silently curses the damn crush once again. “I’ll try and sleep, just… please?”

Keith is a weak man. He huffs loudly, hoping that Lance mistakes the blush he can feel burning high on his cheeks for anything but the mix of excitement and embarrassment that it actually is, and gets up, picking up his knife and stuffing it back into its sheath on his belt.

“Fine,” he grumbles, not looking at Lance. “But only if you really go to sleep after…”

“Promise.” Lance blinks up at him faithfully and fuck, Keith really is weak against these puppy eyes. When did that even happen?

Lance can never know.

He gingerly sits down on the edge of Lance’s bed and awkwardly opens his arms.

“Here,” he says. “Just don’t go around saying you don’t remember, again.” Cradling his crush in his arms again, what’s the big deal, right? Except this time, Lance actually _asked_ for it.

It takes some maneuvering (what with Lance being absolutely unwilling to leave his blanket cocoon) but finally, they end up more or less comfortable with Lance half flopped in Keith’s lap, head leaning against Keith’s chest and arms wrapped around Keith’s middle and Keith’s back against the wall.

“You’re so _pointy_ ,” Keith sighs as he tries and fails to somehow hold onto Lance without being stabbed by one limb or the other.

“Sorry for my bones,” Lance replies, actually sounding sorry, but makes no move to rectify any of this. So Keith sighs and gives in to his fate as a human teddy bear.

“… ‘s fine.” Keith chews on his lower lip and hesitantly puts one hand on top of Lance’s head, petting his hair carefully. “Okay?”

“More than.” Lance has the audacity to let out a small, happy sigh. “You’re so… warm… and comfy…”

“Are you planning to sleep _on me_?” He really should be more outraged about this.

“Mhmm.”

Keith settles back against the wall and sighs soundlessly. He can feel Lance burning up through the layers of blankets and even more so where Lance’s forehead rests against his chest; his breathing sounds like he’s trying to do an impression of Darth Vader and his pointy elbows poke at Keith’s thigh but he’s unwilling to let go again, even if he is risking being discovered by the others when they come back.

“Get better soon, idiot,” he tells Lance’s sleeping form.

“’f you hugm’more,” is the only reply he gets and well. He can do that, at least. He listens to Lance’s raspy breathing and feels his chest swell with fondness. Unthinking, he leans forward a bit to press his lips into Lance’s hair and closes his own eyes too. Might as well get some rest while he can and before Lance wakes up again and turns back into a whiny baby.

And maybe, once Lance is better again, Keith will be brave enough to kiss Lance while he’s awake.

 


End file.
